1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to windows-based operating systems for computers and, more particularly, to a user interface enhancement which allows the user to conveniently perform operations on a displayed window by means of icons displayed in the window""s title bar using a drag and drop operation of the mouse controlled cursor.
2. Background Description
Graphic user interfaces (GUIs) are now standard in most operating systems. Such operating systems are also now multitasking, allowing multiple applications to be running at time. A windowing display is used in which each application runs in its own window, and these windows may be tiled, cascaded or otherwise arranged on the computer display screen so that multiple windows are visible at a time. Only one of the applications operates in the foreground at a time, and this is typically determined by a click of the left mouse button (or the only mouse button in the case of a one button mouse) while the pointing cursor is within the window. Examples of such windowing operating systems are International Business Machines (IBM) Corporation""s OS/2 operating system, Microsoft""s Windows 95 operating system, Apple Macintosh""s System 7.5 operating system, and X-Windows for the Unix operating system.
In the management of the windows displayed on the computer display screen, the user often will want to manipulate a window. For example, the user may want to reposition a particular window and to resize the window. In the case of the Microsoft Windows oprarating system, there are provided a number of standard mechanisms for manipulating displayed windows. For example, with reference to FIG. 1 of the drawings, the user can click and drag on the title bar 11 of a window 10 to move that window. In addition, the user can click on one of three icons 12, 13 and 14 that appear on the right hand side of the title bar of a window to minimize, maximize, or close the window, respectively.
To resize a window, however, the user must move the cursor to a border (edge or corner) of the window, producing a doubled-headed cursor, and click and drag. When the cursor is on a right or left hand edge of the window, the double-headed cursor is horizontal, and movement of the cursor changes the width of the window. Similarly, when the cursor is on the top or bottom edge of the window, the cursor is vertical, and movement of the cursor changes the height of the window. When the cursor is on a corner of the window, the cursor is at 45xc2x0 to the vertical (or horizontal), and movement of the cursor changes both the width and height of the window simultaneously. While this works and is intuitive, it has two disadvantages:
1. Borders are typically very narrow (a couple of pixels), and the user has to position the cursor carefully before clicking.
2. Positioning a window exactly where a user may want it on the computer display screen becomes rather clumsy as the user moves between the title bar (where the window is moved) and an edge (where the window is resized) of the window. In particular, a user often wants to use the bottom right corner of the window to allow simultaneous resizing of the horizontal and vertical borders.
When the window is smaller in vertical and horizontal dimensions than the content of the window, scroll bars are displayed on the right and bottom edges of the window. In FIG. 1, the top portion of the right scroll bar 15 is shown and it will be understood that a similar scroll bar may appear at the bottom edge of the window 10. These scroll bars allow the user to vertically scroll and horizontally pan the content of the window so the entire content may be viewed. Again, while this also works and is intuitive, it also has disadvantages. In particular, the user may need to move back and forth between the vertical and horizontal scroll bars in order to view the content of the window. This is a slow and cumbersome process.
In short, while windows-based operating systems implementing graphic user interfaces (GUIs) have made great improvements in the ease of use of computers, especially by many who consider themselves not computer literate, there is still need for improvement of the basic interface to enhance user ease of operation.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a more convenient way to manipulate a displayed window in a windows-based operating system.
It is another object to provide a user with a convenient way to resize an application window on a computer display screen which also facilitates movement of the window.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a user a convenient way to scroll and pan the displayed content of a window.
According to the invention, there is provided one or more new icons in the title bar of the window. Operations are performed by clicking on one of these new icons and performing a xe2x80x9cdrag-and-dropxe2x80x9d operation of the mouse controlled cursor. One such new icon, called a xe2x80x9ccornerxe2x80x9d icon, is used to resize an application window on the computer display screen and facilitate moving the window after resizing. Instead of moving the cursor to an edge or corner of the window to resize the window, the user simply clicks on this new xe2x80x9ccornerxe2x80x9d icon and drags the icon to resize the window. This mechanism allows other enhancements. For example, an optional magnification factor allows the window to be resized in an amount proportional to a multiple factor of the actual cursor movement. Thus, small changes in cursor movement result in large changes in the window size. The reverse is also useful to allow very precise window positioning. Another such new icon is a xe2x80x9cscrollxe2x80x9d icon. Instead of using the scroll bars at the right and bottom edges of the window, the user simply clicks on the xe2x80x9cscrollxe2x80x9d icon and drags it. A vertical movement of the mouse produces a vertical scrolling movement of the content of the window, and a horizontal movement of the mouse produces a horizontal panning movement of the content of the window. The particular advantage of the xe2x80x9cscrollxe2x80x9d icon is that it is not limited to simply vertical and horizontal movements but may instead be moved in any direction, producing combined scrolling and panning movements of the content of the window.